This invention relates to an ammunition loading assembly, a gun provided with such an ammunition loading assembly and a drive chain assembly for such an ammunition loading assembly.
A conventional flick rammer for loading a projectile into a barrel of a gun flicks the projectile, from a position outside the chamber, along the bore of the chamber into the bore of the barrel. A first disadvantage of such flick rammer is that, to enable engraving of the projectile in the barrel, concentric alignment of the projectile and the barrel is required, which is not always accurately achieved owing to the distance the projectile is flicked. This is aggravated at high elevations of the barrel.
A second disadvantage of the flick rammer is that if the energy with which the projectile is flicked into the barrel is insufficient, fall-back of the projectile occurs. This is especially so if the elevation of the barrel is greater that 45 degrees and where the concentric alignment of the projectile and barrel moves out of kilter during movement of the projectile along the chamber, resulting in the sides of the projectile bouncing against the insides of the chamber, thus reducing the kinetic energy thereof.
Furthermore, should the energy with which the projectile is flicked into the barrel be too much, bounce-back of the projectile occurs. Moreover, with a conventional flick rammer, the energy applied to the projectile is relatively difficult to control and the engraving depth of projectile is therefore inconsistent.
A further disadvantage of the conventional flick rammer is that it is not suitable for loading a charge into the chamber of the gun, as charges are often relatively soft and deform when flicked into the chamber. This could cause jamming of the breech.
U.S. Pat. No. 5,895,880 discloses a chain projectile rammer including a rammer pawl for engaging the base of a projectile with a rigidisable chain attached to the rammer pawl for providing reciprocating movement thereto. The rigidisable chain includes a plurality of rows of links having adjacent links pivotally attached to one another. A perimeter of each link enables fixed engagement of adjacent links on each row upon coordinated pivoting of adjacent links in each row. The perimeter of each link further enables release of the fixed engagement upon reverse coordinated pivoting of adjacent links. A drive is provided for reciprocally moving the chain and for pivoting adjacent links of the chain in order to rigidise the chain as the chain is moved in a forward direction and to unrigidise the chain when it is moved in a reverse direction.
A first disadvantage of this projectile rammer is that the construction of the chain is relatively complex making the chain prone to jamming. A second disadvantage is that ammunition rounds are not loaded into the barrel of the gun but into the breech, and is therefore suitable only for smaller caliber cased ammunition. Since the cased ammunition rounds are delivered only to the breech and not to barrel, the same disadvantages as to that of the flick rammer, discussed above are encountered with this type of rammer.